what is original research

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About Original Research
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Original Research Articles

Definition : An original research article communicates the research question, methods, results, and conclusions of a research study or experiment conducted by the author(s). These articles present original research data or findings generated through the course of the authors' study and an analysis of that data or information.

Published in Journals : Origingal research articles are published in scientific journals, also called scholarly or academic journals. These can be published in print and/or online. Journals are serial publications, meaning they publish volumes and issues on a schedule continually over time, similar to a magazine but for a scholarly audience. You can access journals through many of the library's databases. A list of recommended databases to use to search for original articles on biology subjects can be found through this link , accessible from the database "subject" dropdown on the library homepage.

Peer Reviewed : Prior to being published, original research articles undergo a process called peer review in an effort to ensure that published articles are based on sound research that adheres to established standards in the discipline. This means that after an article is first submitted to a journal, it is reviewed by other scientists who are experts in the article's subject area. These individuals review the article and provide unbiased feedback about the soundness of the background information, research methods, analysis, conclusions, logic, and reasoning of any conclusions; the author needs to incorporate and/or respond to recommended edits before an article will be published. Though it isn't perfect, peer review is the best quality control mechanism that scholars currently have in place to validate the quality of published research.

Peer reviewed articles will often be published with "Received", "Accepted", and "Published" dates, which indicates the timeline of the peer review process.

Structure : Traditionally, an original research article follows a standardized structure known by the acronym IMRD, which stands for Introduction, Methods, Results, & Discussion. Further information about the IMRD structure is available on the Reading Original Research Articles tab of this guide.

Why is Published Original Research Important?

Current information : Typical publication turnaround varies, but can be as quick as ~3 months.

Replicable : The studies published in original research articles contain enough methodological detail to be replicated so research can be verified (though this is a topic of recent debate ).

Contains Raw Data : The raw original research data, along with information about experimental conditions, allows for reuse of results for your own research or analysis.

Shows Logic : Using the provided data and methods, you can evaluate the logic of the authors' conclusions.

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Last Updated: Sep 6, 2022 4:02 PM
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Finding original (or "scientific") research articles: Definition and description

Definition and description
Where do I find these articles?
How do I understand them?
What's the point?

Original research articles are primary sources:

An "original" research article is a detailed account of research activity written by the scientists who did the research--not by someone else who is reporting on the research; it is a primary resource . Some instructors may refer to these as "scientific research" articles or as "empirical" research.

Defining "empirical" research:

The Merriam Webster Dictionary defines empirical as: "originating in or based on observation or experience research; capable of being verified or disproved by observation or experiment."

photo of scientists, research in a science lab

Image source: " Lab Laboratory Research Scientific Science " by felixioncool is licensed under the CC0 license (public domain)

Anatomy of a scholarly article

Take a look at this very helpful web page created by librarians at NCSU (North Carolina State University).

Anatomy of a Scholarly Article Interactive display of a scholarly article. Created by NCSU Libraries, CC BY license

Common characteristics of most original research articles

Written by multiple authors (usually three or more)
Authors are always identified and their credentials displayed
Long, technical article titles with specialized terminology
Lengthy--a minimum of six pages, often twenty or more
Introduction that includes the problem, question(s), and research objectives
Literature review: a description of what other scholars have written about the problem
Methods or Approach
Methods, Study, Results
Randomized, Double blind, Placebo-controlled
Article text will describe and analyze the problem, experiment or study, with technical language or jargon understood by others in that field
Chart, graphs, and/or tables often included
Lengthy references list
Published in professional or scholarly journals

Here's what a citation might look like

closeup of citations in a research article

A Pilot Study of Gene/Gene and Gene/Environment Interactions in Alzheimer Disease .By: Ghebranious, Nader; Mukesh, Bickol; Giampietro, Philip F.; Gluhch, Ingrid; Michel, Susan F.; Waring, Stephen C.; McCarty, Catherine A., Clinical Medicine & Research , Mar2011, Vol. 9 Issue 1, p17-25, 9p, 5 Charts;
Developmental Trajectories of Marital Happiness in Continuously Married Individuals: A Group-Based Modeling Approach . By: Anderson, Jared R., Van Ryzin, Mark J., Doherty, William J., Journal of Family Psychology , 08933200, Oct2010, Vol. 24, Issue 5
Occurrence of genetically modified oilseed rape seeds in the harvest of subsequent conventional oilseed rape over time . European Journal of Agronomy , Volume 27, Issue 1, July 2007, Pages 115-122. A. Messéan, C. Sausse, J. Gasquez, H. Darmency

(Also, please note that the citations above are NOT cited in either APA or MLA style.)

Image source: “ Scientific citations ” by Finn Årup Nielsen is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 license

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Last Updated: Mar 21, 2024 10:25 AM
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Research Process

Introduction
Topic Selection

Originality

Information Needs
Evaluating Sources
Getting Sources
Getting Organized
Understanding Your Sources
Putting it into Words
Bringing it Together

One way to think about originality in research is to think about how many times someone else has analyzed information. These can be described as primary, secondary, and tertiary information, and often instructors want you to use primary sources so they can see what you have to say about the information you find. The gallery provides information about and examples of primary, secondary, and tertiary resources:

First-hand accounts or documents related to the topic from people who had a direct connection with it, such as speeches, diaries, letters, interviews, photographs, original research, and dataset. They can be found in archives, historic newspaper databases, scholarly journal articles, image databases, and data resources.

Example: An original handwritten poem by Frederick Douglass, held in the Xavier archives.

Resources that add some interpretation, analysis, or provide context for primary sources. Books, articles, and documentaries that are about a topic are most likely secondary sources. They can be found in print or electronic books, database articles that are not based on original research, and documentaries.

Example: The "About this Collection" description and contextualization of the poem "Liberty" by Frederick Douglass

Resources used to find primary or secondary sources or give general information rather than analysis. It can be found in reference materials such as encyclopedias, dictionaries, background databases and some websites.

Example: Frederick Douglass page on allpoetry.com, which shares basic facts of his life and the text of the poem.

More about Original Research

As you participate in the scholarly conversation, it is important to understand what kinds of original research are being done by academics and how that fits with the research you are doing. Most original research is done as either qualitative or quantitative:

From Research to Publication: The Life of a Journal Article

1. Conduct Original Research

Original research is done when the researchers are responsible for the entire process of coming up with a hypothesis, a means for testing the hypothesis, defending their hypothesis based on prior research, and gathering and analyzing the data, and explaining their findings. This is often done by scientists, doctors, college professors, or people working within a field of study.

Researchers must present their findings in a very thorough manner so that other researchers could replicate their work and reach the same conclusions. Their writing must follow specific style rules and writing conventions that match the preference of the publication, or journal , where they will submit their work.

3. Submit to Editor

The journal editor's initial job it is it make sure that the submission matches the subject matter of the journal and is written according to the style rules for their publication. The editor then identifies other people who are experts on the same content the article is about, or peers , and sends the article for them to read.

4. Peer Review

The peer group of experts receives the article and reviews the content to ensure that the science being used to do the research is reasonable, the data was conducted accurately, analyzed in a way that is free of errors, and the authors have reached a conclusion that is supported by their research. They then respond to the editor letting them know whether they feel the article is ready for publication.

5. Editor Decisions

The editor reviews the feedback of the peer group and decides if the research article should be accepted for publication, rejected, or sent back to the authors for revisions based on peer feedback.

6. Published

If the editor accepts the article for publication, it is now available to be published in that journal. Depending on the frequency, method, and business model of the publication, it can take a year or more for the article to become available for others to read.

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How to write an original research paper (and get it published)

The purpose of the Journal of the Medical Library Association (JMLA) is more than just archiving data from librarian research. Our goal is to present research findings to end users in the most useful way. The “Knowledge Transfer” model, in its simplest form, has three components: creating the knowledge (doing the research), translating and transferring it to the user, and incorporating the knowledge into use. The JMLA is in the middle part, transferring and translating to the user. We, the JMLA, must obtain the information and knowledge from researchers and then work with them to present it in the most useable form. That means the information must be in a standard acceptable format and be easily readable.

There is a standard, preferred way to write an original research paper. For format, we follow the IMRAD structure. The acronym, IMRAD, stands for I ntroduction, M ethods, R esults A nd D iscussion. IMRAD has dominated academic, scientific, and public health journals since the second half of the twentieth century. It is recommended in the “Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals” [ 1 ]. The IMRAD structure helps to eliminate unnecessary detail and allows relevant information to be presented clearly in a logical sequence [ 2 , 3 ].

Here are descriptions of the IMRAD sections, along with our comments and suggestions. If you use this guide for submission to another journal, be sure to check the publisher's prescribed formats.

The Introduction sets the stage for your presentation. It has three parts: what is known, what is unknown, and what your burning question, hypothesis, or aim is. Keep this section short, and write for a general audience (clear, concise, and as nontechnical as you can be). How would you explain to a distant colleague why and how you did the study? Take your readers through the three steps ending with your specific question. Emphasize how your study fills in the gaps (the unknown), and explicitly state your research question. Do not answer the research question. Remember to leave details, descriptions, speculations, and criticisms of other studies for the Discussion .

The Methods section gives a clear overview of what you did. Give enough information that your readers can evaluate the persuasiveness of your study. Describe the steps you took, as in a recipe, but be wary of too much detail. If you are doing qualitative research, explain how you picked your subjects to be representative.

You may want to break it into smaller sections with subheadings, for example, context: when, where, authority or approval, sample selection, data collection (how), follow-up, method of analysis. Cite a reference for commonly used methods or previously used methods rather than explaining all the details. Flow diagrams and tables can simplify explanations of methods.

You may use first person voice when describing your methods.

The Results section summarizes what the data show. Point out relationships, and describe trends. Avoid simply repeating the numbers that are already available in the tables and figures. Data should be restricted to tables as much as possible. Be the friendly narrator, and summarize the tables; do not write the data again in the text. For example, if you had a demographic table with a row of ages, and age was not significantly different among groups, your text could say, “The median age of all subjects was 47 years. There was no significant difference between groups (Table).” This is preferable to, “The mean age of group 1 was 48.6 (7.5) years and group 2 was 46.3 (5.8) years, a nonsignificant difference.”

Break the Results section into subsections, with headings if needed. Complement the information that is already in the tables and figures. And remember to repeat and highlight in the text only the most important numbers. Use the active voice in the Results section, and make it lively. Information about what you did belongs in the Methods section, not here. And reserve comments on the meaning of your results for the Discussion section.

Other tips to help you with the Results section:

▪ If you need to cite the number in the text (not just in the table), and the total in the group is less than 50, do not include percentage. Write “7 of 34,” not “7 (21%).”
▪ Do not forget, if you have multiple comparisons, you probably need adjustment. Ask your statistician if you are not sure.

The Discussion section gives you the most freedom. Most authors begin with a brief reiteration of what they did. Every author should restate the key findings and answer the question noted in the Introduction . Focus on what your data prove, not what you hoped they would prove. Start with “We found that…” (or something similar), and explain what the data mean. Anticipate your readers' questions, and explain why your results are of interest.

Then compare your results with other people's results. This is where that literature review you did comes in handy. Discuss how your findings support or challenge other studies.

You do not need every article from your literature review listed in your paper or reference list, unless you are writing a narrative review or systematic review. Your manuscript is not intended to be an exhaustive review of the topic. Do not provide a long review of the literature—discuss only previous work that is directly pertinent to your findings. Contrary to some beliefs, having a long list in the References section does not mean the paper is more scholarly; it does suggest the author is trying to look scholarly. (If your article is a systematic review, the citation list might be long.)

Do not overreach your results. Finding a perceived knowledge need, for example, does not necessarily mean that library colleges must immediately overhaul their curricula and that it will improve health care and save lives and money (unless your data show that, in which case give us a chance to publish it!). You can say “has the potential to,” though.

Always note limitations that matter, not generic limitations.

Point out unanswered questions and future directions. Give the big-picture implications of your findings, and tell your readers why they should care. End with the main findings of your study, and do not travel too far from your data. Remember to give a final take-home message along with implications.

Notice that this format does not include a separate Conclusion section. The conclusion is built into the Discussion . For example, here is the last paragraph of the Discussion section in a recent NEJM article:

In conclusion, our trial did not show the hypothesized benefit [of the intervention] in patients…who were at high risk for complications.

However, a separate Conclusion section is usually appropriate for abstracts. Systematic reviews should have an Interpretation section.

Other parts of your research paper independent of IMRAD include:

Tables and figures are the foundation for your story. They are the story. Editors, reviewers, and readers usually look at titles, abstracts, and tables and figures first. Figures and tables should stand alone and tell a complete story. Your readers should not need to refer back to the main text.

Abstracts can be free-form or structured with subheadings. Always follow the format indicated by the publisher; the JMLA uses structured abstracts for research articles. The main parts of an abstract may include introduction (background, question or hypothesis), methods, results, conclusions, and implications. So begin your abstract with the background of your study, followed by the question asked. Next, give a quick summary of the methods used in your study. Key results come next with limited raw data if any, followed by the conclusion, which answers the questions asked (the take-home message).

▪ Recommended order for writing a manuscript is first to start with your tables and figures. They tell your story. You can write your sections in any order. Many recommend writing your Result s, followed by Methods, Introduction, Discussion , and Abstract.
▪ We suggest authors read their manuscripts out loud to a group of librarians. Look for evidence of MEGO, “My Eyes Glaze Over” (attributed to Washington Post publisher Ben Bradlee and others). Modify as necessary.
▪ Every single paragraph should be lucid.
▪ Every paragraph should answer your readers' question, “Why are you telling me this?”

The JMLA welcomes all sizes of research manuscripts: definitive studies, preliminary studies, critical descriptive studies, and test-of-concept studies. We welcome brief reports and research letters. But the JMLA is more than a research journal. We also welcome case studies, commentaries, letters to the editor about articles, and subject reviews.

How to Do Original Research

How to do original research? Although you’ll probably conduct most of your research online or in the library, remember that there’s a great deal of material you can find in laboratories, in courthouses, and in private archives. Consider the possibility of conducting some original research for your research paper. You can do this by interviewing knowledgeable people and devising and distributing questionnaires or surveys . This may be required in class, so always check with your professor.

Original research is research you conduct rather than find in books or articles. It is also called primary research because it starts with you. If you plan to conduct primary research, like an experiment, personal interviews, or a survey of people, you will need to devise a basic methodology for your inquiry. A methodology is simply a statement of the procedure you will follow in conducting the research. Depending upon the type of research you are conducting, the methodology could include:

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A step-by-step sequence of procedures performed for an experiment.
Questions to be asked in personal interviews.
The names of people you plan to interview or a profile of the people you plan to interview.
The questionnaire you will use in the interview.
A demographic profile that segments people you will survey by such things as age range, gender, educational levels, income bracket, geographic location, or common interests.

A good methodology lends credibility to your research paper. If you are conducting an experiment, for instance, it is important to record the process so that others can later repeat the experiment and get the same results. It also provides important background for your readers and ensures consistency across your results. Whenever you conduct interviews, your readers will be interested in what questions you asked and what the person answered. If you are conducting a survey, it is important to ask everyone in the survey the same questions so that you can compare responses. It is also essential to note whom you surveyed so that you can say something about the attitudes of the particular group.

How to Conduct Interviews

Interviews allow you to conduct primary research and acquire valuable information unavailable in print and online sources. By including quotations from people who have direct knowledge of a particular subject, you add considerable authority and immediacy to your research paper. You can conduct interviews by telephone, by e-mail, or in person.

Often, you can find subjects to interview via the Web sites you visit in your research. Use the contact form at the Web site to extend your invitation. Allow plenty of time. If you want to interview the person who runs the site, he or she may get back to you immediately.However, most often your request will have to be forwarded to an appropriate individual or routed through “channels,” usually the public relations office of the sponsoring organization.

7 Steps in Arranging Interviews

Identify whom you will interview.
Locate and contact the person.
Invite his or her participation.
Determine how you will interview the person—by phone, in person, or by e-mail.
Assemble the questions you will ask.
Forward the questions to your interviewee.
Request the right to ask follow-up questions.

Who should you interview? Include only respected people in the field. Don’t waste your time with cranks and people with private agendas to further.

Guidelines for Requesting Interviews

Identify yourself by full name and title.
Explain your assignment/project.
Explain your topic.
State your time frame.
Offer an idea of how much time the person should allow for the interview.
Ask for the interview, requesting either someone who is able to speak to your topic or a specific interviewee by name.
Provide your contact information.
Finish with a cordial closing as you would in a letter.
A day or two before the interview, send an e-mail reminder or telephone the interviewee to confirm the time and date.

Interviews can be conducted via e-mail , by telephone , or in person . There are advantages and disadvantages to each method.

E-mail interviews are convenient; interviewees can respond at their convenience. They also provide you and the interviewee with a written record of what was asked and answered. However, they also place a burden on the interviewee by requiring the person to write out responses that you normally would record in a telephone or face-to-face interview. Be prepared to give considerable thought to questions you prepare in advance. Follow-up questions are difficult in e-mail and you do not want to waste the time of people who have graciously agreed to be interviewed. Be specific and complete in your questions to avoid getting answers that require followup because they do not deliver the information you need. Avoid questions like,”What do you think of social networking?” Instead, be specific with questions that seek detailed information, such as, “What is the most significant trend in social networking that you see emerging among teenagers, and why do you believe it’s the most significant?”

Telephone interviews are more open-ended and offer you the opportunity to follow up with questions that might occur to you in the course of the conversation. They are not good options, however, if you are excessively shy or if the interviewee is uncomfortable with them. They can also be difficult to arrange if the person maintains a busy schedule. Never insist on a telephone interview; choose the format that is most convenient for the interviewee. Finally, it is useful to record telephone interviews so that you can later review what was said and ensure accuracy on any quotes you use;however,always ask the permission of the interviewee before recording an interview.

Face-to-face interviews , like telephone interviews, are not for the shy and can be difficult to arrange. However, they offer you the opportunity to meet the interviewee. This can be particularly valuable if you are meeting in a setting that is pertinent to your course of inquiry, such as the person’s laboratory or a social setting that pertains to the topic, such as an Internet café if you are discussing social networking, or a troubled housing project if you are discussing the influence of neighborhood environments on high school completion rates, crime rates, or family support networks.Ask the person’s permission to record the interview at the time you make the appointment.

If you are doing a telephone or face-to-face interview, be sure you allow the interviewee to do the talking. Do not interrupt or rush the person through the interview. Many times, interviewees will use the opportunity to promote recent books, writings, or product/service introductions. If they do, let them and then proceed to the questions that are of interest to you. Cutting off an interviewee can set a bad tone for the interview and produce disappointing results.

As you incorporate interviews in your paper, you must accurately and fairly present their views and opinions—even when they do not conform to your own. Be sure to do your research in advance. Read at least one thing your interviewee has written on the topic. Have a good sense in advance of what the person will say about it.

How to Conduct Surveys

Surveys are useful when you want to measure the behavior or attitudes of a fairly large group. On the basis of the responses, you can draw some conclusions. Such generalizations are usually made in quantitative terms: “Fewer than one-third of the respondents said that they favored further governmental funding for schools,” for example.

Fortunately,Web sites and software programs abound to help you design surveys by offering a structure for organizing the survey, prompting you to enter questions, and tabulating the results. Online free polling services include Zoomerang , and Polldaddy . The New York Times offers a lesson on poll creation, called “To Free or Not Too Free,” for middle school and high school teachers in its Learning Network at http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/ .

Surveys should be carefully focused and ask specific questions to minimize ambiguities or bias in the findings. Questions should be crafted and presented to ensure that the data you collect will allow you to make the kinds of determinations you seek. Surveys should follow a structure that informs respondents of the purpose.

Structuring Your Survey

Give your survey a title.
State the purpose of the survey.
Tell respondents where the information will be published
Include a privacy statement explaining with whom you will share the information and how it will be used.
Get the respondents’ permission to use the data they provide.
Describe how the survey will be conducted.
Set a deadline for when you need the results.
Tell the respondents how to complete the survey. Be very clear about how they should answer the questions (i.e., whether they should check, circle, or underline the answer or write a response in the blank provided).
Thank respondents for their time.

You want the respondents to complete the surveys. For that reason, the surveys should not be too long. Aim for 25 to 30 questions. The choices presented to respondents should be straightforward and easy to respond to. Questions can be presented in the following ways:

Yes or no/true or false
Multiple choice
Ratings on a scale, usually 1 to 10
Ranking in order of importance or preference

Yes-no and true-false questions are the most straightforward. Multiple choice questions can be problematic if the respondent does not identify with the choices given; these should always include options such as “don’t know” or “none of the above” that leave room for exceptions. Rankings allow respondents to express qualitative preferences by assigning a number that reflects their attitudes according to a scale.

Rankings, on the other hand, ask the respondent to place a series of items in order. Comments can be the most revealing as they ask the respondent to state their opinions or describe something; however, they are difficult to tabulate as the results cannot be easily fitted into categories. As you begin designing questions, ask yourself: What, exactly, do I want to determine? Surveys are typically conducted for one of two different reasons. Attitude surveys can be short and simple, focused around a single issue and pose a single question or a short set of questions. For example:

Do you believe that the quality of education would improve if the school year was lengthened to offer more hours for instruction?

Surveys designed to identify trends tend to be much longer than other kinds of surveys. This is to provide a qualitative view of related issues rather than one that is simply based on a yes or no answer. For example:

How would you rate the quality of education in your local school district?

a. Excellent
d. Below average

Adding questions that gather demographic data allows you to make distinctions about the individuals being polled and interpret their answers according to group affiliations. Questions asking the person’s age range or income can also be relevant for your research, but such questions should always be respectful of peoples’ privacy. Rather than ask survey respondents to divulge their sex or annual income, for instance, present the respondents with a range and give them the option of not answering, such as:

c. I prefer not to answer

What is your annual income?

a. under $25,000

b. $25,001–$50,000

c. $50,001–$75,000

d. $75,001–$100,000

e. Over $100,000

f. I prefer not to answer

Tabulating Your Survey Results

A great deal of care should be taken to correctly tabulate results.This can be a challenging task if you have not collected data through an online site or from a form that provides automatic analysis. Researchers who expect to review and tabulate the data themselves would be well advised to work with a small group of respondents (no more than 20) to keep the task manageable. The American Statistical Association (ASA) and the American Psychological Association (APA) publish excellent guidelines on how to conduct surveys and tabulate the results. The ASA’s publication What Is a Survey? can be downloaded from https://www.whatisasurvey.info/download.htm . The APA offers numerous articles on conducting surveys at its Web site http://www.apa.org/ .

In addition, many topics have been extensively discussed by experts on respected television news programs and documentaries. It is often possible to write to the television station and obtain printed transcripts of the programs. You might also be able to videotape the programs or borrow copies of the programs that have already been recorded.